The Honourable Frances Alice Mary Fitzalan Howard was born in 1892, the daughter of Francis Edward, 2nd Lord Howard of Glossop. She entered the V.A.D. in September 1915, and after a short period with the Charing Cross Hospital, London, served in France in No. 3 General Hospital, Le Treport, and No. 2 Stationary Hospital, Abbeville. She returned to England in Novenber 1917.